Africa south of the Sahara is home to the majority of the world's poorest countries and millions of Africans must live on less than a dollar a day.

There are many reasons why the continent has not benefited from the growth in the global economy. One of the most telling - and most frequently overlooked - is transport, or the lack of it.

This week, Earth Report takes a look at a number of innovative low-cost initiatives and how they are helping to bridge the transport divide.

The road to development

The development of the community starts with the road.

Roads not only provide access to markets, but also access to healthcare, schools and markets.

But even with a road, without low-cost transport millions of African's have a long walk to their destinations.

Time and money

Rural Africa is a place where people walk - to fetch water and firewood, to travel to the market, to tend to the fields and to get to school. Trips of up to 20 kilometres that take more than two days are common.

In Kindia, Guinea, women travel up to three hours to reach the local market, carrying as much as 30 kilos of produce on their backs.

Local transport, in the form of trucks, is available but often overcrowded and expensive leaving women little option but to walk.

Access for all

In colonial times and since independence, the decision-makers in town have poorly served Africans living in the countryside. Then, prestige projects that did little to improve their lot were in favour. But there are signs of change.

If poverty in rural Africa is to be addressed, ready access is needed to services and markets. And it doesn't mean borrowing the vast sums that have loaded Africa with its huge debt burden. If vehicles are too expensive to be obtained, then simple things like footbridges or wheel barrels could ease the burden.

One solution was as simple as providing a donkey.

Donkey express

The TanZam highway stretches from Tanzania all the way to Zambia. Just off the highway, near Morogoro, lies Kinyenze, a Masai village of about 130 people.

During the 1970's the Tanzanian government encouraged the traditionally nomadic Masai to settle down into village life, which meant getting rid of most of their livestock - including their donkeys.

When they first settled and started to use vehicles for transportation they soon learnt how expensive this could be. As a result, almost 20 years later, the donkey is making a comeback through a pilot development programme which is changing the lives of the villagers - giving them low-cost transport to surrounding areas.

On your bike

Paos Koto is a small town 250 kilometres outside Dakar, Senegal.

In the 1990s a single lane tarmac road was built linking Senegal with neighbouring Gambia and Guinea but the road didn't benefit the people of Paos Koto as much as it was supposed to. They couldn't afford to buy a moped, let alone a truck but in August of 2000 the government's Rural Travel and Transport Program, together with Afribike, a South African organization, brought 150 bicycles to Paos Koto. Overnight the village was transformed.

Now, children can go to school in minutes instead of hours, healthcare is readily available and workers can transport their goods and services with relative ease.

Bicycles make good people-carriers but in some parts of Africa people have a much heavier load to carry.

Businesses are beginning to develop vehicles using pedal-power - like the bicycle-ambulance - but these prototypes are still too expensive for most people.

Community spirit

Good transport alternatives aren't be much use without good roads or tracks. In many villages across rural Africa, tracks and roads that were once built have not been maintained and have reverted to bush.

Guinea is so poor that the government doesn't have a policy of road building or maintenance in the countryside - so the rural villagers have to do it themselves.

In Telimele the whole district pitches in three times a year to maintain the roads. Each village maintains only the section of road that runs through their village. The community working together keeps the roads kept open.

Road gangs

In Malawi an innovative approach to road building is being tested. This pilot project not only builds and maintains roads, but also provides skills and income to the local people.

Each village puts forward two candidates, a man and a woman to go through a rigorous selection process. The successful candidates receive training with the project coordinators who will spend about a year and a half with the trainees, issuing them with contracts, before moving on.

Once trained, the coordinators employ up to 100 local people to maintain the roads.

But not all roads have a positive impact.

Two way street

Luisa is an orange farmer from Tanga, Tanzania. Her life and her farm were transformed when a road was built into her village. Now she can travel outside the village. But it also means that other people, middlemen, can get in.

These traders travel to buy up the oranges from the villagers. The farmers are experienced in the harsh realities of the free market but the traders are the ones with the vehicles - and they drive a hard bargain offering the farmers far less than the retail price.

It's clear that an integrated transport system - from the ground up - is needed and this means low-cost transport as well as well-maintained roads.

Listen up

Under pressure from creditors, African governments are experimenting with reforms. Most resources for infrastructure improvement are used up on primary and secondary roads and the landscape is pock-marked with grand scale projects that by and large have failed to raise the standard of living of the rural poor.

But the main international development assistance agencies are focussing on schemes to lift the poor out of poverty. And they are finding that listening to, and catering for, the modest wishes of the people who live in the countryside is the best way forward. Progress at the pace the people want it to be.